So what’s new, exactly? Let’s start with a little history first. In late 2016, the enhanced/pro consoles arrived, signalling the era of 4K games - so I came up with the idea of supplying our 4K videos in the form of high quality downloads, since YouTube didn’t cut the mustard quality-wise (and not much has changed there). It was also an experiment to see what kind of support we could get from the audience - bearing in mind how much work goes into our projects, how many people would like to support our endevours? Last year, we took stock of our efforts and decided to revamp the whole thing, concentrating on building a community, offering more access to the team, providing more exclusive content - and of course, seeking to fund massive DF Retro projects, like testing out a whole generation’s worth of 1080p games on PlayStation 3. The missing piece of the puzzle? Reflecting everything we were doing on our website. Now, thanks to herculean efforts from the ReedPop tech team, we’ve got the site we always wanted, bringing together our wish to show off all of our videos, to integrate more deeply with the various Patreon tiers we have, while at the same time addressing quality-of-life requests from the audience such as chronological lists of new videos, RSS feeds and an actual search function. Assuming you’re not a supporter, checking out the site shows the unsigned-in view, while the image above gives a flavour of the premium supporter page while this link offers a full look at the site from the perspective of a retro supporter. From my perspective, one of the biggest improvements of the new site is how it opens up our archive of content in an easily accessible way. Previously, supporter-exclusive content was only published on Patreon, with links to download versions. Now, all tier-specific material is easily accessible. So whether it’s downloadable, compiled versions of the Unreal Engine 5 Matrix Awakens and Valley of the Ancient demos, behind-the-scenes explainers on our tools or major projects or sharing more of the data that never makes it (fully) into our videos, it’s all there and easy to find. On the Retro tier, we produce supporter-exclusive videos where John Linneman and Audi Sorlie share their latest retro pickups, or embark on mammoth supporter Retro Q+A sessions. The list of content continues to grow - and now it’s all readily accessible to newcomers and veteran backers alike. By my reckoning, across Premium and Retro tiers, we’ve put out around 70 exclusive videos since April 2021. Adding to the content haul, I’m happy to report that DF Retro’s next major project goes live in early access form to Retro tier supporters this weekend. John Linneman has teamed up with My Life in Gaming’s Coury Carlson to produce a massive two-hour epic on the Klonoa series, starting from the franchise’s PS1 origins, culminating in coverage on the recent remasters for modern gaming hardware. We’ve got big, big plans for further DF Retro episodes - and it’s only through the Supporter Program that we’ve been able to make that possible. Check out the site and if you like what you see, join us!
